raquel tjernagel

track & field

school:

New Westminster

freshman’s future: Texas

The two women were at first a little speechless.

World-class sprinters and two-time Canadian Olympians at the 1996 and 2000 Summer Games, each let out a gasp and began to contemplate what they had just witnessed at a track meet in California.

“We were both like, ‘Holy cow, did we just see that?’ ” remembers Tara Self (nee Perry). “I was sitting with Ladonna Watkins, and we both knew we had just seen a huge time. For just a second, you didn’t want to be the person who shouted out something that wasn’t right.”

One split-second later, however, they cheered with the full realization that the performance turned in by Grade 12 sprinter Raquel Tjernagel, in the 400 metres, was indeed something special, if not historic.

The New Westminster Hyacks and Coquitlam Cheetahs star had completed her onelap run around the track at California’s Bryan Clay Invitational in a time of 52.52, which was not only the fastest time in the world this season for an under-20 female, but the fastest by any Canadian female this season.

It was also a new Canadian high school record, and just a half-second shy of hitting the standard for the 2016 Rio Olympics.

That same weekend, Tjernagel also set similar Canadian high school in-season records in the 100 metres (11.58 seconds) and 200 metres (23.34 seconds).

“And she is still only 17,” says Self, who coaches Tjernagel with the Cheetahs club team. “She won’t be 18 until October.”

Through the recruiting war that soon ensued for her services, Tjernagel decided ultimately to be hooked by the Longhorns, and will begin her collegiate career this fall in Austin at the University of Texas.

“For me, I just felt the most comfortable at Texas,” Tjernagel says.

“Once I was there, it just felt like the right place. I could picture myself there.”

Without question, Tjernagel made an indelible imprint on the provincial high school scene, where she leaves as the twotime defending 100-metre champion, and the three-time defending 200-metre champ.

Yet it is Tjernagel’s vast potential that makes the future so exciting.

Before her 18th birthday, she could well be running for Canada at the Pan Am Games in Toronto. The IAAF World Championships are also not out of the question.

And if Tjernagel’s goal was to make the Olympics after university, she has, in jetlike speed, arrived ahead of her time.